


Cause You Feel Like Home

by thegalrahobbitofplantetgalilfrey



Series: Aftermath Chaos [3]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Gen, Guns, Hunk is a cinnamon roll, I know, Keith is calmer than Hunk, Kidnapping, fistfights, it's crazy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-21
Updated: 2017-02-21
Packaged: 2018-09-26 01:40:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9856310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegalrahobbitofplantetgalilfrey/pseuds/thegalrahobbitofplantetgalilfrey
Summary: They've saved the earth from the Galra, sure, but can they save themselves from the earth?





	1. Life, Love and Hurt

**Author's Note:**

> Yay, Hunk's turn!

“Everybody, in the kitchen!” Mrs. Holt got up and ushered everybody into the next room as another explosion rocked the house. She closed the door and locked all seven locks. She pulled shutters over the windows, shutters of pure steel. Mr. Holt whistled.

            “I disappear for two years and you turn the kitchen into a doomsday bunker.”

            “My husband and son go to the military and disappear and then my daughter goes, and she disappeared. I don’t trust them, and they aren’t getting me as well.” Hunk pried open the shutters a little to peek outside.

            “Guys, guys, I think you should see this.” He was almost trampled in the rush to get to the window.

            “What the… But those aren’t Galra! Those are humans!” Mrs. Holt ushered them away from the window and firmly shut the shutters.

            “They may be human, they may be aliens, but they aren’t taking any of you ever again, and they aren’t getting in my kitchen!” There was a pounding on the door. A flash of light made Hunk look. Keith had his shield activated. Apparently he had kept the arm of his armor on under his jacket, and had his bayard in his pocket, because that was activated as well.

            “Keith, how…” Hunk guiltily pulled out his bayard and was relieved to see the other paladins doing the same. Well, at least they could all be paranoid together. Although Keith was the only one paranoid enough to bring part of his armor. The thudding increased and the paladins gently shoved their relatives behind them. Mrs. Holt started handing frying pans and pots to Lance’s siblings and instructing them to hide under the table and only to smack people who came near them. She herself was wielding a heavy stir fry pan, while the other adults had kitchen knives. The door started to crack. And then… It splintered into a thousand pieces and the strangers came pouring in.

            Hunk set his bayard onto a stun setting and opened fire, as did Lance. Pidge began tasering their attackers, and they all wore expressions of surprise as a tiny female single-handedly took them down. But then they recuperated and started firing their guns back. And that’s when Keith swooped in with his shield to cover them.

Hunk looked around frantically for something to use as a shield, and his gaze fell upon the lid to the stir fry pan. Perfect. He grabbed the handle and held it up, charging and ramming the people firing into a wall. With such close quarters, everybody had to stop shooting at risk of hitting their own teammates. Now Pidge, Keith and Shiro had the advantage, as did the adults with pots and pans. Hunk used his pan lid to shove people to the ground where Lance’s siblings gleefully started smashing them over the head with their pans. Hunk shuddered and reminded himself never to make those children angry.

“Stop!” Hunk paused. The leader of the attackers was holding up one of Lance’s siblings with a gun pressed to her head. She kicked at him violently, and he snarled, giving her a shake when her foot connected with his chest. Based on the numerous bruises that were forming on his head she’d gotten him with her frying pan pretty good.

“If you don’t want me to hurt her, drop your weapons.” Lance’s gun clattered to the ground, as did the weapons of all the adults. Hunk’s was next, as well as Pidge’s grappling Taser. Shiro’s arm deactivated. And finally, the last holdout, Keith hesitated before dropping his sword.

“Good. Now then.” He started to squeeze the trigger. Hunk heard someone roar, no, that was him, and then the leader was twitching and falling down. His gun had been aimed at the dead center of Hunk’s chest. Pidge’s grappling hook was attached to him, and it snaked back to her, her face red with rage.

And then she wasn’t there. It was like she’d disappeared. And the only person standing there was a different thug. He picked her unconscious body off the ground while aiming a gun at them. He backed away, and then ran, his fellow men keeping their guns pointed. Then they were gone. Shiro was the first to react. He roared and ran out the door, the others only a minute behind him.

Keith and Lance left him in the dust. He just wasn’t fast enough. Why? Why did he have to be so unable to help, why couldn’t he keep up? He was too slow. Hunk could hear the sounds of a fight and he ran towards them. He turned a corner, and found his worst nightmare. A decision between lives.


	2. Decisions

“Whoa. Hey, we can talk this out, just put… my… friends… down.” They resolutely kept their grips on Keith and Lance, who were furiously struggling to no avail. Hunk sighed.

“Why can’t you just ask nicely? What are you trying to do here?” One of them shrugged

“I dunno. We’re just doing what we were told to do.”

“Why?”

“Um…”

“Do you even have a real motive here?” Hunk could see the musclebound men beginning to question themselves. Maybe he could end this peacefully.

“We’re being paid for it.”

“It is it worth it? Is it worth your health and safety for the amount of money you’re being paid? Don’t you question the morality of kidnapping teenagers? Is it worth being caught and thrown in jail?”” the other man’s forehead crinkled.

“Not really…”

“So why are you doing this?”

“Because if he betrays us, we’ll kill him.” Another man stepped out of the shadows. Hunk gulped. This guy was really the leader, he could tell. Not just hired muscle.

“So, the yellow paladin.”

“Yeah, that’s me, the yellow paladin. I don’t suppose you’d order these guys to let my friends go?”

“But of course.” Wait. Really? “I’m not a cruel man. Pick one of them and we’ll let him go. Then we’ll take the other one with us. So, which will it be?” A bead of sweat trickled down Hunk’s head. Choose? Between friends? His head and heart started to wage war on each other.

His head told him to pick Keith, Keith would be more of a help tracking down the kidnappers and rescuing Lance, Pidge and Shiro. But his heart screamed Lance, Lance, his best friend who he’d known for years, who had less of a chance surviving this than Keith. The shadow man smiled. He had known what this would do to Hunk. Not cruel, his foot. He was about to choose his heart, to ask for Lance, but Lance shook his head no. What? Lance edged his head toward the struggling red paladin and winked. He nodded.

“Keith. Give me Keith.” Keith looked just as surprised as the shadow leader. The shadow man frowned and motioned to the man holding Keith, who released him and gave him a shove towards Hunk. Or tried to. Keith stepped to the side of him and roundhouse kicked the guy holding Lance. He collapsed, and Lance rubbed his wrist. Apparently they had thought he would be Hunk’s choice, for they hadn’t bothered tying him.

“Duck!” Keith obeyed Hunk’s order and Lance grabbed the outstretched arm of the man behind him and yanked. Keith stood up, and the guy was knocked over. Hunk joined the fray, and they didn’t stand a chance. Keith jumped over his tied hands so they were in front of him, and the three paladins circled up to protect each other. To watch each other’s backs.

“Hunk, to your left!” Hunk smacked the attacker and he fell to the ground.

“Thanks, Lance, you’ve got one to your right.”

“Got it, big guy. He punched the guy in the jaw and he collapsed. Lance shook his fingers. “Ah! How do you _do_ that?!”

“Duck!” a swing from the last man standing careened over Lance’s head, and Hunk rammed him to the ground. He didn’t bother getting up.

“I think that worked pretty well, what do you guys think?”

“Ya’ll. What do ya’ll think.” Lance swung around with a delighted grin to stare at Keith, who put his head in his still-bound hands. “I said that out loud, didn’t I?”

“Oh yeah.” Keith turned to Hunk.

“Put me out of my misery, please.”

“I didn’t think Pidge was telling the truth, but… Now I know!”

Keith pointed to his head. “Right here. Make it fast.” He cocked his head. “Wait, whatever happened to the leader guy? We didn’t beat him up!”

“Why are they even after us? We saved the earth!” Lance immediately started to pace, before hitting himself on the head.

“Oh, that’s obvious, it should be so obvious, Hunk you said it we saved the world, why would they want to kill/kidnap us?”

“Because we saved the world! We saved the world, but America has claims on us, being in their military and all.”

“Exactly, Hunk, but why?”

“We’re like their poster children, the four American teens and the American pilot who saved the world, we’ve become symbols!”

“Right! So in kidnapping us, they’re saying, ‘ha, ha, look at America’s amazing heroes!’”          

   “Okay, Plan B. We go to the police, this isn’t really paladin stuff, it’s earth politics!”

“No, these people are obviously trying to get attention, so we’ll just be giving it to them, we have to do this ourselves. What do you think, Keith? Tiebreaker.” Keith was tugging on the ropes with his teeth.

“Honestly, I think that was like watching your brains work on the outside of your head.”

“You know what I mean.”

“I’m going to ask this again. Where’s the leader guy?”

“That’s not important right now.”

“Really? I rather think it is.” Hunk heard the sound of a gun being cocked, and turned to see him slink out of the shadows. “I mean, I’m more likely to kill you all now than your friends are to die right now. Now let’s see… you chose Keith, right, yellow paladin?” He leveled the gun at Lance. “I hope you like the fruit of your choice.” His finger slowly moved back. And the gun fired.


	3. The Fruit of Your Choices

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry in advance

“Lance!” Lance jerked and fell, a surprised look on his face as blood blossomed on the front of his shirt. Keith roared and chased after the shadow man and Hunk was left alone. Left alone with his choice. The bullet was lodged right in Lance’s left shoulder, thankfully not in his heart, but all Hunk saw was the blood, his wounded friend.

“Lance, c’mon, don’t die, please don’t die.” He cradled his limp form. What had he done? He had to stop it, had to stop the bleeding, or Lance wouldn’t survive. He carefully peeled off Lance’s jacket and he moaned. He had fainted from shock, and Hunk thanked his lucky stars that he had. The bullet had gone right through at such short range, so at least he didn’t have to worry about getting it out. That was good. What had he done? His friend was going to die, he was going to die, and it was all his fault.

“Hunk, Hunk, snap out of it, buddy!” Keith smacked him. When had he gotten here? Keith dropped a suit coat from the shadow man in front of him. “Tear this up and use them as bandages, or he’s going to bleed out.” Hunk obeyed. Keith let him borrow his knife to help. That was nice. Keith never let anyone touch his knife.

“Hunk, focus!” Hunk shook his head. He couldn’t afford to go into shock. Lance was counting on him, because Keith was still tied up. Wait. Should he cut Keith free? No, Keith would’ve told him to cut the ropes, but he had told him to cut bandages for Lance, and he was going to do that. Keith woke Lance up. Hey, Lance needed rest, he couldn’t stay awake. At least that’s what Hunk thought, and he told Keith so.

“No, he needs to stay awake, or he’ll drift away. Put what’s left of that jacket on his shoulder, both sides, he needs to sit up.” Hunk did as he was told, and Keith applied pressure. Lance screamed, and Hunk shoved Keith away, he couldn’t hurt Lance.

“Hunk, he’s going to bleed too much, he needs pressure on that wound, you have to let me… Hunk, we have to apply pressure, or he’s going to die!” The rational part of his brain told him Keith was right, and eventually that part of his brain let Keith through.

“Lance, I need you to hold on, this will help.” Lance shook his head, and Hunk started to agree. No, Lance didn’t need that. “Listen to me, you stubborn idiot, it doesn’t matter how it feels to you, this will help, and you _will_ let me do it because Shiro isn’t here, which makes me leader by default, so you _have_ to listen!”

“Never… wanted you to be leader.”

“Duly noted. Now hold still.” This time Lance gritted his teeth, and Keith pressed the cloth to his shoulder. “Hunk, wrap the bandages around. Tightly.” Hunk did it even though Lance whimpered, because this would help. And it did. It stopped bleeding through and Keith stepped back with a sigh, leaving Hunk to cradle Lance, who giggled from a delirium of pain and blood loss.

“Wheee, I’m a cowboy on my trusty lion! High-ho Blue, away! Ya’ll better get out of my way! Ha, Keith, Keith, I’m using ya’ll, are you happy? I’m a Texan! Hey Hunk, we’re having a bonding moment! You’re cradling me in your arms!”

“Yeah, he’ll be fine.” Hunk didn’t pay attention; didn’t even realize he was clutching the knife until Keith gently pried it away from him.

“Hunk?  I called Mr. Holt, and he’s coming to pick you guys up. I’m going to find Shiro and Pidge. Stay with Lance until the Holts get here, okay? You’re in shock, I know, so just stay put until they get here.” Hunk nodded. He wasn’t leaving Lance’s side. Not for anything. Keith ran back down the alley. Hunk sat, and he waited. And he never left Lance’s side.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah... That happened... apologies, and if ya'll didn't get the lone ranger reference, you are dead to me.


	4. Enough

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Right, I'm back, here we go.

“Hunk? Hunk, you need to get cleaned up. Come on, we need to get you changed, you’re covered in blood.” Hunk didn’t pay attention. “Hunk, come on honey. We’ll stay with Lance, his family is here, he won’t be alone, I promise, and we called an ambulance, it’ll be fine. Come on.” Hunk got up and followed his mother, while Lance’s siblings and parents poured in. He got changed and washed the blood off of his hands and arms before returning to Lance’s room and sitting back down with him again. One of Lance’s siblings crawled into his lap and looked at him with big brown eyes.

“Hunk? Is he gonna be OK?”

“Yeah. He’s gonna be fine.” If only he could convince himself of that.

“Hunk?”

“Yeah?”

“Why did someone shoot my brother? I thought all the bad aliens were gone!” Hunk swallowed. How did he explain to this innocent child that another human had done this?

“It wasn’t an alien.”

“Well, I didn’t think it was, because now the only aliens are your friends right?”

“Yeah. It was another person.”

“Why?” Hunk’s throat closed up.

“Because… Because I made a bad decision. They told me to choose someone, Keith or Lance, and Lance wanted me to choose Keith. We won, but another bad guy shot Lance.” The little girl wrinkled her nose at him.

“That’s stupid. You can’t blame yourself for that.”

“But it was my choice!”

“Yeah, but you beat them! That guy came back later. He’s the bad guy, not you, Hunk.”

“But he only shot Lance because that was my choice.”

“It’s still stupid. How’re you supposed to know what would happen? And it was Lance’s choice, anyway.”

“But it was my choice!” She bopped him on the nose

“Don’t be stupid. I say it wasn’t your fault, and I’m his sister, so I get to say whose fault it is. And I pronounce you innocent.” She put her nose in the air and crossed her arms. One of Lance’s older brothers laughed.

“Don’t try to resist. You won’t win this fight. She’s as stubborn as a mule.” Mr. Holt poked his head in the room.

“Hunk? Can I talk to you a sec?” Hunk followed him out of the room. “We’ve lost contact with Keith. He had us on the phone, and he told us where he was told they’re keeping Pidge and Shiro.”

“Who told him?”

“Guy who shot Lance. He interrogated him. Anyway, he gave us a place, and then there was nothing on the other end. We couldn’t hear anything, and he never picked up again.” Hunk looked back at the room where Lance lay, still as a stone. They kidnapped two of his friends and shot his best friend, and obviously had done _something_ to Keith. No. They couldn’t do this. He’d tried to end this peacefully, but now it was time to go on the offensive, or they would never stop.

“Hunk? You want to call the police?” Hunk shook his head. Lance hadn’t wanted him to, and he was going to respect that.

“I’m going to get them back.”

“Okay, Hunk. You’re near the area Keith’s cell signal. I may not be Pidge, but I can at least track that much.” Hunk nodded determinedly.

“Got it. Now what?”

“He said something about being near their base, so look around.” Hunk heard a soft beeping and saw a cell phone on the ground, still running. He picked it up.

“Hello?”

“Oh! Keith! Glad you picked up, we were worried.”

“It’s Hunk. I guess I found Keith’s phone.” There was blood on the ground. Oh, no. No, no, no, no, no, no. What had happened?” he followed the trail of blood to a seemingly abandoned warehouse. He kicked the door down, and a trapdoor was up inside. Ha. He climbed down the ladder into the base. The blood trail continued down the hallway, but stopped in a medical bay, where some men were being treated for some nasty looking stab wounds. Hunk let out a sigh of relief. It wasn’t Keith’s blood. The sigh was a bad idea.

“Hey! You!” Hunk backed up and knocked down a barrel. Hmmm…

“Sorry,” he shouted, and rolled the barrels into them. There were cries of surprise as he ran away, turning down the hallways at random. Then he heard Keith shouting. _Oh, bless your temper, you wonderful Texan alien._

“And when Hunk rescues us, you’re gonna be in _big_ trouble!”

“Keith, give it a rest. They won’t listen.” Hunk winced at the bone weary tone in Shiro’s voice. There was the sound of a thump and muttering. “Oh. I get it. Yeah,” Shiro yelled louder, “You’re all going to, uh, get crushed! Because Hunk is… going to crush you!”

“Leave this to us, Shiro.” Pidge! She was here too! “You idiots better let us out! I _know_ that the _big one_ has the _keys_ so he’ll be Hunk’s first target! That’s right, look scared, all of you! You can run, but Hunk is just going to stop you!” Hunk gulped. Way to pile pressure on a guy, Pidge. No problem. Get the keys from the big one. Absolutely fine. He could do this. Except they were all big. OK. The biggest one, then. He put on the most menacing face he could muster, which was a bit like a teddy bear trying to look intimidating, but it worked. They dropped the keys and ran for it.

“Way to go, Hunk!” Hunk picked up the keys. Shiro’s right arm was chained to Keith and Pidge’s so he couldn’t activate it without hurting them. Ooo, that was clever. Devious, but clever. He undid the chains and Keith and Pidge began to rub feeling back into their arms. Shiro just stared at his metal arm.

“Come on, all of you, we have to get out of here!” Shiro nodded.

“Let’s go.” They began to run. “Keith, how did you find us?” Keith shrugged.

“I interrogated someone.”

“ _Keith_!”

“What? He’s not hurt. Permanently.” Pidge stumbled and Hunk picked her up. She didn’t complain, she let him carry her.

“We have to leave.”

“What? But Mr. Holt, we just got here!”

“No. You have to leave. This city is taken over. They’re swarming the streets, looking for you.”

“Who are?”

“Terrorists!” Lance stirred weakly from his place on the bed.

“I know where we can go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah, you guessed it, part four is about Lance. Sitting on the Sea.

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah... I'm sorry. Just, I'm sorry for (gestures vaguely) that.


End file.
